A Voyage of Discovery: Betsy and Bubba on the Road

Happy Memorial Day to you all in gentler climes. It began to snow last night. They had opened the Dunraven Pass in the park for the season on May 26. On May 27, they closed the pass. While the other roads remain open, driving conditions on the mountain passes at high elevations are tricky. Some of our guests left early, particularly international guests with complicated connections, but the overwhelming majority are enjoying Christmas in May. Although the ground is finally warm and wet enough that the snow is not sticking at the Lake Yellowstone Employee RV Park, it’s still a pretty wintry scene in my back yard.

I worked until 10 last night and drove home in a winter wonderland. Back to work at 6:15 this morning. When I got off at 2:30, I headed down to Fishing Bridge for a ranger-led program on cutthroat trout. I think the ranger was hoping no one would show up; it was squally and snowing. An older couple from Ohio and I were the diehards. Now at least I know the difference between a lake trout and a cutthroat trout in appearance, and know a little more about the ecology of Lake Yellowstone and the importance of this keystone species.

I headed back to the van and an overeager Bubba, who has been patient while I worked back to back shifts with little time for him. After a brisk walk we repaired to the van. Some things aren’t much different in confined living spaces. I made a cup of tea, baked some banana bread, did a little work on the NY Times Crossword Puzzle (available on line, they certainly don’t deliver here!) Others are quite different: a run in the snow to avail myself of bathroom facilities, regardless of the weather.

The biggest difference is missing friends and family, especially the kids. The people I work with are lovely and friendly, so are the visitors, the rangers, etc. But the depth of history I have with my very good friends and my much loved children adds so much richness to my life, even the rough spots and sad moments. I know that I will find that community eventually wherever I go. But, on this snowy day, I would love to be spending an evening laughing at bad jokes, snuggling up with loved ones watching a movie, digging out the cream cheese to go with the banana bread and tea, and sitting in front of the wood stove with the people I care about.

I know now that someone, at least one someone, is reading this weblog, since Nancy Whitin e-mailed to find out if I’d actually driven off the edge of the Sylvan Pass. So I’d best be more disciplined about keeping up.

The hotel opened on May 19th with the annual opening ceremony, that involves the staff, and a few early bird guests, gathering in the lobby while Bethanie, head of the bell staff, plugs in the mahogany grandfather clock at exactly 11:00 AM opening day. The season will conclude with her unplugging the clock at 11:00 AM October 8. It would seem a little more romantic or dramatic if she had to swing the pendulum, plugging it in seems a little tacky, but so be it. Of course, with the multiple power outages we experience here, it will be a full time job keeping the clock on time, or we’ll be working at least an extra week!

Despite my greatest fears, I am functioning reasonably well on the computer. Still a bunch of tricks to learn with this arcane DOS-based system, but the staff is very helpful, and most have been through multiple seasons with the system from hell, so they can straighten me out and keep me out of trouble.Certainly none of the mistakes I make are life and death matters, and, in my first week, my cash drawer and register log have balanced out. Most of the guests are delightful. They are here to enjoy a vacation and the park, want to know what we can tell them that they might enjoy, want to find out where to spot wildlife and tell us what they spotted. There are the occasional guests from hell. They walk in loaded for bear(the appropriate place to do that, I guess!), already know they won’t like their rooms or the meals, certainly don’t like the staff; the reassurance is in the knowledge that they’ll be gone in one or two days.

For the pleasant ones, you become a little like the barkeep in their favorite neighborhood bar. While there are four desk clerks lined up, they’ll return to the one they started with to share stories of their day, get a heads up on tomorrow’s weather, or just chat.

Many of the guests are international visitors. Their accommodations are booked by travel agents at rates even more extravagant than the already high rates; we are duty bound not to tell them the real rates, nor to make any alterations to their rooms, even if they want to pay to upgrade.

One guest checked in but demanded a change in rooms before they even saw the room they were assigned to. Three days later, they asked for a new room, were shown the original room they refused and loved it. The certain solution is service with a smile, no matter what, and get the supervisor to resolve any issues. A couple of the stafff sought the opportunity to be a “senior guest service agent”: the first line behind the desk clerk. Not I; I seek to resolve no problems, just want to be another bozo on the bus this summer.

I got a few days off to visit with Carol, Jim and Roger. I drove over to West Yellowstone where they were staying, and convinced myself to actually book a motel room for the night, so long had it been since I’d enjoyed a real bath tub. On Sunday, Carol and I drove up to Big Sky, about 40 miles north of West Yellowstone, and went for a ride in the Gallatin National Forest. Nice horses, gorgeous views, fascinating crossings of raging streams with water up to our shoe soles. I’m not sure Maybelline would have been up to the task.

On Tuesday, they picked me up and we drove to Bozeman for a little tour, then on to Billings. I remembered Billings from our first visit as a cute and quaint little western town. Billings has grown enormously, and not, from what I saw, necessarily for the better. Homeless shelters, missions, addicts on the street, bars on homeowners’ windows, closed businesses, a general sense that bigger has not necessarily been better for Billings. I dropped them at the Billings airport on Wednesday morning and drove back to Bozeman, delighting in driving a little car that gets 52 miles a gallon instead of a big van that gets 15 miles a gallon. I visited with Andra while Bubba swam in their fishpond, and took a little tour of their neighborhood, ran a bunch of errands and headed back into the park.

Apparently I’d missed all the excitement. There are two young male grizzlies in the neighborhood. Both have just been kicked out of the family unit by their moms, in anticipation of new arrivals. One cruised through the employee rv park Tuesday night, parked himself on a neighbor’s picnic table for a while, and finally drew the attention of the rangers, who are doing their best to prevent the creation of problem bears by hazing them out of the area. I was blissfully unaware when I returned last night and strolled out to the bathroom in the dark. Tonight I’ll be a little more observant.

Scheduling gave me another day off today, so I enjoyed the car, and drove up to Gardiner to visit with Sue Stormer who will be boarding Maybelline when I can finalize her trucking arrangements. She is competent, knowledgeable and friendly, and has a bunch of young girls working with her who are the same. She tells me that May will quickly acclimate. I hope she’s right, but also feel a little timid about taking off alone on trails here where the physical challenges are so much greater than May and I have experienced together. I will need to find some riding buddies.

I took a leisurely ride back through the park later in the afternoon, and enjoyed one of my favorite sights: the regeneration of the forests. In 1988, a mild winter resulted in a moderate to severe drought by May, when the first of several fires was ignited by lightning strikes. Drought conditions, lightning, and at least one fire started by careless disposal of cigarettes, resulted ultimately in the burning of 800,000 acres within the park and 600,000 acres in surrounding national forests. When the kids and I first came to the park in 1992, scarred burned “ghost” trees stood eeriely against the sky, but a wealth of grasses, forbs, wildflowers had emerged upon removal of the canopy provided by the trees. We have returned to the park on several occasions since, and I have had an opportunity to see the unique phenomenon of rebirth.

At first glance, if you haven’t been watching the landscape over time, it still looks eerie, disturbing and lifeless.
In high winds, the ghost trees can come crashing down with an explosive sound. But the lodgepole pines have a unique biology that is stimulated by fire. In addition to their regular cones, the have special ones called serotinous cones. These cones have a resinous coating which, in the heat of fire, melts and releases the seeds. Now, nearly twenty years after the fire, the floor of the old forest is carpeted with young trees, in some areas still quite small, in others, as high as 15-20 feet.
For years, Smoky told us to prevent forest fires at all costs. The fires are a pretty natural part of the ecology of the area, and, while we hope for less disastrous fires than the ‘88 ones, the forest ecology is quite remarkable in restoring itself without our intervention or help.

I spent the rest of my afternoon at LeHardy Rapids on the Yellowstone River. The river is just below flood stage, and the flow has abated a little from last week, when the ice went out on May 18. As the flow slows, the bird life is returning. The harlequin ducks are nesting secretively along the rver’s edge. Only one male was fishing the rapids while I stood in the woods on the banks. This section of the river appeals to them- fast-moving and relatively secluded. They disappear under the quick waters and dive for crustaceans and mollusks.
Also frequenting the rapids are the white pelicans, in what I’ve heard referred to as the wash and rinse cycle: they drift down river with the current, diving along the edges for mollusks, then fly back upstream. There are dozens of pelicans swimming the river. The males have an interesting ridge, a sort of keel, on their beaks, during the breeding season.

This is the season of fertility: grizzlies and black bears strolling through the meadows with their cubs, heavily pregnant elks waiting to deliver (and the grizzlies are waiting for them as well) birds paired off and breeding, bison calves just big enough now to frolic behind their mothers’ backs, wildflowers emerging every day as the snows recede. Well, at least for the moment; snow is forecast for Friday night.

Living in a van has some inconveniences. Before you can drive off, you must unplug your connections and stow all your belongings. I hadn’t properly appreciated how much like living aboard it was until the first time I hit a bump and stuff went flying through the air. I’m gradually developing systems, but am glad that the car will be along shortly. I spoke with Carol on Monday, and they were just passing through Joliet, Illinois. With the price of gas going above $3 in the park today, the efficiency of the Toyota will be welcome. Still, there are great conveniences to having your home on your back.

Friday morning, I severed my connections, in anticipation of a trip to Bozeman that night. I used that as an excuse for an early morning bear prospecting expedition, as a couple of people from work had seen grizzlies at a nearby location.I drove about four miles down the road to Sedge Bay, a gentle curve on the shores of Lake Yellowstone. I pulled up by a lone pickup truck with the largest longest camera lens stuck out the window. There, lazing in the grass and munching on his spring vegetarian diet was a male grizzly bear I have since learned is about 4 years old, and apparently as amused by humans as we are by him.

I won’t go so far as to anthropomorphize these critters a la Timothy Treadwell, but, during the hour or so I watched this guy, he stretched, yawned, and munched on spring greens. Apparently there’s a big grizzly sow and her cub who have just moved into the neighborhood of the campground and will be waiting for the local elk to drop their calves so they can enjoy a snack. Nature isn’t all pretty or benign, but it is certainly fascinating, and an incredible opportunity to be an observer from the front row seats. Some of my co-workers were out early yesterday morning watching wolves gnaw on an elk carcass just off the road a few miles to the north.

I drove up to Bozeman, MT on Friday after work to bartend and otherwise volunteer for Andra Spurr at her annual “Spring Run-Off” Fundraiser for the Big Sky Youth Empowerment Program. The longest part of any drive here involves getting out of the Park. The distances are not huge, only about the size of the state I come from, but you come around a corner and there’s a herd of slow-moving and fractious bison in front of you, or find the road blocked by a bear-jam, a knot of traffic, often regulated by a ranger, of folks stopped in midstream to watch wildlife in the fields or trees. As we drove east to west across the park, on our way north (there’s no direct route from anywhere to anywhere), Bubba spotted a lone coyote strolling down the road and wanted to stop for a frolic with a fellow canine. I had to explain that this fellow was not quite as play-minded as he.

We drove up through the Paradise Valley through what I have since learned is the annual Mother’s Day Caddis Fly hatch”, an institution that involves trying your best to remove their gummy residue from your hood and windshield. My best has so far been none too good.

Andra’s event was a great success, as far as I could tell. We parked in their back field, and Bubba was awakened early by a bark at the door from Boulder, the border collie, who wanted him to come out and play. He had a chance to really stretch his legs and chase ground squirrels, something he’s not allowed to do in the national park setting. We drove back to the park in time for work at 1, this time by another route, down the west side of the park, through Gallatin Gateway and Big Sky, a beautiful drive along the river. A couple more days of training left my brain fried, and we had Monday off. My plans were shaped by what appeared on Saturday to be a damaged converter on the van, meaning no power, accompanied by the smell of something burning and vaguely electrical. I took off Monday morning, with one of my co-workers riding shotgun, to Bubba’s dismay, for Cody, Wyoming, the nearest big town to our location, some 87 miles east. Don’t confuse near with fast. We drove about 16 miles east to the Sylvan Pass. The Sylvan Pass is under construction, and construction can only take place during the spring and summer months as the snow is so deep, and the avalanche danger so great, the rest of the year. For those of you who know my fear of heights, picture the scene: the road is gravel, with a pretty sheer cliff to the north and a pretty precipitous drop to the south. We drove to a point where a young woman flagger stopped us and we waited for the pilot car coming from the other direction leading a line of traffic. We only had to wait about a half-hour; other waits have apparently been much longer, the folks heading eastward had been delayed waiting for blasting on the road. The truck arrived followed by a line of about 20 vehicles. The pilot turned around, swapped drivers, and headed off to the east, with the van being the car right behind the pilot. The road was narrow and bumpy, and periodically we were passed by heavy equipment moving in the opposite direction. It just didn’t look as if there was enough room to pass. Bulldozers were climbing steep grades on the uphill side of the road moving massive piles of rock. At a top speed of 15, we moved through this ordered chaos, and I tried to not look downhill, thinking the ride back would be easier and better now that I knew what to expect. Coming out the other side, we moved through country that looked like every western I ever saw as a kid: meadows full of sage, cottonwood and aspen groves, and red sandstone rock formations twisted and shaped by erosion into fascinating shapes. We drove the hour to Cody, and spent a few hours wandering after I got the good news from the RV repair place that they thought my problem was not a big one.

Cody’s main street is full of shops catering primarily to the tourist trade. There is the Buffalo Bill Historical Center, which is supposed to be fascinating and well worth a full day; we just didn’t have enough time today so it merits a return trip. Saddleries, gift shops, and galleries are interspersed amongst attractions like the Irma, the hotel Buffal Bill slept in, and eateries with cowboy motifs, mostly self-described as saloons and featuring burgers. The back streets are lovely, wide and tree-lined, with charming houses, small and attractive, well-maintained, many wwith victorian detail. The lilacs were in bloom. I’ve been missing them all the way across country, and Bubba and I walked around town intoxicated by their fragrance.

We headed back to the east entrance to the park, only to learn that the road was closed. It’s closed every evening during the construction season from 8PM to 8 AM, but this particular unanticipated closure was caused by unexploded ordnance falling on the road. An old Howitzer is perched on top of the mountain by the pass, and fires off rounds to trigger avalanches during the winter. This round landed on the road, and required evacuation and flying in a munitions expert from Las Vegas to deal with it. Our option was an hour drive back to Cody, then a five hour drive up the Chief Joseph Scenic Highway to Cooke City, Montana. I couldn’t be sorry that we had to take this rather long detour. It was one of the most stunning drives I’ve ever made, through beautiful high country, and a slow drive at that, harpin turns across two mountain passes, 25 mph, absolutely gorgeous breathtaking country. We came back into Yellowstone through the northeast entrance around 8PM but could not take the most direct route back to the Lake; that pass is still closed by snow, not scheduled to open for another ten days. So it was another hour and a half via the circuitous route. We are definitely operating on Yellowstone time. Our bosses have been quite clear though; bison jams or closed roads are not excuses for tardiness, we drove on through the darkness to get back in time. Even the late portions of the trip had their secret benefit. Getting back to the campground and plugging in around 10:30, I took Bubba, the patient dog with the expansive bladder, for a late walk. We heard the call of a great gray owl from the woods to the west of my campsite. The stars were brilliant, the night, cold and clear.

With no cell service, no wireless, and communications from a pay phone only, something that I understand can now make one a terrorism suspect, I’ve gotten a land line and am a customer of Internet Montana. Here’s a few notes from the last few days.

May 8, 2006.
We began our training at the Lake Yellowstone Hotel on Saturday afternoon, after a cookout with the front desk staff at our manager’s cabin on Friday night. It’s an eclectic crew, ranging in age from a young woman from Florida who just finished her freshman year to a couple of women and one man who are retired and back for their severalth seasons.

The hotel is reminiscent of the old hotel in The Shining, I keep waiting for Jack Nicholson to walk around the corner with that leering grin. The rooms are spacious and clean, and far above the accommodations we’ve stayed in before in the Park, even if they don’t look to be equivalent in comfort to outside hotels for the same price. The common areas are quite lovely, beautiful etched glass above the desk and on the doors to the dining room and gift shop, a stunning sunroom overlooking the lake, an elegant dining room and dinner menu to match. Housekeeping has just started, so all the chairs are piled up, none of the rooms are made up, it’s a work in progress. Quite a feat, putting this whole park together in a few short weeks after the snow melts to get ready for the guest season. We open on the 19th of May. The computer system is indeed the system from hell; I was being pretty cavalier about saying I couldn’t imagine how we’d spend 10 days in training unless my fellow workers were terminally stupid. Well, I think I’m the stupid one! It’s a complex DOS-based system that is counter-intuitive. Hopefully, by the time we open I’ll have a clue; I don’t right now!

Monday was the highlight to date. Since we need to know other accommodations in the park, since we need to be familiar with the park natural features, and since we need to sell tours and activities, they sent us all on a bus tour around the southern half of the park. I am once again positively enraptured with the place, the diversity of wildlife, the fascinating thermal features, the stunning landscapes and the wonderful air. Of course, the seasons are a little different, it snowed on Sunday night and it is snowing as I write this Monday night. But the snow let up long enough for us to complete our tour. We went to the requisite eruption of Old Faithful ( Included in staff’s favorite guest quotes from seasons past: “What time is Old Faithful’s next erection?), toured a number of geysers, watched wildlife in the Hayden Valley. Our tour guide, one of the regular bus drivers, a/k/a interpretive guides, was young, a self-described college dropout, and incredibly knowledgeable about the Park and its ecology. We learned about native cut-throat trout being threatened by introduced lake trout, the dynamics of the thermal features, bear behaviors, and park history and politics.

Birders in RI and MN, in a short window, I saw buffleheads, white pelicans, sandhill cranes, common goldeneyes, and, the highlight, harlequin ducks surfing the rapids at LeHardy Rapids on the Yellowstone River. The bison here have just calved. Haven’t seen bears yet, but the area I’m living/working in is supposed to be a hotbed of grizzly activity.

May 9, 2006

Welcome to summer in Yellowstone. We had three inches of snow last night, and temperatures down to 11 degrees. This morning was sunny and beautiful, but the pavement was covered with about an inch of ice, and a few inches of snow on top. There were snow squalls throughout the morning, but, by afternoon, it had cleared and we could see across the Lake to the Grand Tetons.

We spent another day in training and I continue to be the dunce of the class. I can ask great questions and see the issues and problems, but am having great difficulty finding my way around this cumbersome reservations system on the computer. No doubt it will all seem quite old hat by the first of June, but for now…well, I’m glad we have a week and a half until we open, time to study and practice.

I spoke with Carol tonight; she, Jim and Roger are looking forward to hitting the road next weekend to come out here with my car. I warned her that they’d better dress warmly. I am looking forward to having the car, as the distances here are so great, and the mileage on the van, not so great. Besides, every time I have to drive somewhere, I have to stow everything. Definitely a high class problem.

May 7, 2006
Bubba and I spent two days enjoying Andra and Dan Spurr’s hospitality in the little cabin in the field behind their garden. I awoke each morning to see the sky lightening behind the Bridger Mountains to the east. Bubba was thrilled to have an opportunity to check out the many prairie dog holes in the back field.

Andra is working as Development Director for the Big Sky Youth Empowerment Program, an organization she has been involved with since moving to Bozeman, first as a volunteer, then as a Board member, and now as part-time staff. Of course, it’s not in her nature to be part-time anything, and, during my stay, she was getting ready for a major fundraising event next week, but still had the time to be a great host, to chauffeur me to car repairs, run my errands, and, with Dan, to entertain me. I volunteered to help her with her tasks for the event and she devised an errand for me that had me driving out into an absolutely beautiful area outside of Bozeman I’d otherwise not have seen. I also went with Dan to attend the Responsible Alcohol Server training, and will come up from the park to bartend for the event on the 12th.

On Wednesday, I drove out to Clyde Park, to visit with George and Patricia Leffingwell at the G Bar M Ranch. Sarah, Benjamin and I have enjoyed three wonderful weeks at the ranch over the years, and I returned for an equally wonderful one last year with Carol Beekman and Sandy Carney. Their gracious welcome to guests is no different for someone dropping in for a cup of tea. Patricia showed me the wonderful greenhouse she has got going this summer, and the vegetable garden all dug up and ready to go. Given that it was snowing lightly as she toured me around the garden, it made her accomplishments to date all the more impressive. I left their house and went up to the lodge, where I had coffee with Mike, Pete and George, and their only guest for the week, a young woman from London who’d never ridden a horse before and was having the time of her life- I was jealous, and waiting for Mike to invite me to ride out with them—in vain. Mike told me he knew and had used the trucker I’ve spoken with about transporting Ms. Maybelline; he had high praise for him, so I will complete her transport arrangements and hope to see her soon.

I spent my last night in Bozeman in the van, ready for an early departure, but Andra was tapping on my door at 5:45 to say goodbye, and had coffee ready for me. I drove to Gardiner and checked in with the folks at Xanterra Human Resources, a welcoming and relentlessly upbeat bunch. There were only about thirty of us checking in on the 5th, and most will be working at the front desk at the Lake Yellowstone Hotel. After picking up my uniform, I drove back up the road to see the place where I will be boarding May. I didn’t meet the owner, but spent a good bit of time walking around with a woman who works for her, lives and boards there. An elderly gentleman, an artist, who lives next door, has horses, stopped by to see who had the foreign van and had coffee with us. He gave me a lot of history of the area. Right down the hill are the remains of coke ovens, used to prepare the coke for sending to Butte for use in the Anaconda smelting process. He gave me lots of information about the trails in the area, but was quick to note that most of the ones in the immediate area are very steep, and that May probably won’t be up to it this summer. I’m certainly noticing the effects of the altitude, and am sure that she will as well. Clearly I’ll have to find a truck and trailer to use to get her someplace where she and I can get out on a little more level ground. The neighborhood is an interesting one.

I returned to Gardiner and drove on into the park, got my sticker pass for the season, and went to an orientation, then on to Lake Yellowstone, about 50 miles south of Mammoth, the northern area of the park. Travel is slow, winding roads, folks stopping to see wildlife even at this time of year. It’s about 1 ½ hours now to get to the northern entrance of the park, will take considerably longer once summer comes. Finally, my first glimpse of Lake Yellowstone through the trees.

Bubba and I checked in with the personnel office at the hotel, then went on to the employee rv park, which we’d driven by without noticing it. We met Hal and Al, two older gentlemen who manage the campground, and Hal took me for a long tour, touting the disadvantages of each site. He particularly focused on the young guy who will be hosting a Cinco de Mayo party Friday. I sensed that much of his displeasure was occasioned by the fact that us old folks aren’t invited! Bubba and I settled on a site next to Pat and Al; Pat will be working with me at the hotel. So welcome to our summer home!

May 5, 2006
I received the very sad news Thursday from Newport of the death of Emily Roberts. For ten years, Emily was my children’s stepmother. She was their friend, advocate, and cheerleader. She rarely missed a school event, or any opportunity to celebrate their successes. She often came to me with her perceptions of what they needed, what would help them, what would help me to help them to succeed. I was not always gracious about accepting her thoughts, but she loved them so much that she came to me even when I was prickly about receiving her input. She was always there for them, and whether I was gracious about it or not at any given moment, I thought my children were fortunate to have her love and caring.

Emily often seemed fragile to me, but, when she came twice to visit me at Overlook Farm, once when Sarah was there, I thought she had found peace and was embarking on a course that excited her passions. She was thrilled with the opportunities she had to teach, and to train teachers, in a small community in Belize that she had come to know and love. She asked me in detail about what I had learned about sustainable development at Heifer International, and left with materials she wanted to apply to her time in Belize. Before her trip to Belize, she went to see Benjamin at Middlebury, and went to a play with him, one for which he had been building the set. She sent me a long and enthusiastic e-mail about what she’d seen of his life in Vermont, and how happy and successful he seemed to be there. She was so pleased that Sarah was excited about her research opportunities for this summer, and looking forward to hearing about the outcome. And she was delighting in my adventure, looking forward to reading and hearing more about it.

I believe that my children and I were fortunate to have Emily’s voice and presence in our lives. We will all grieve her loss.

We pulled into a campground in Miles City, Montana. The folks who run it, Kevin and Lisa McRae, have done pretty much what I am doing. They were from Kansas City, their kids were grown and out of the house, and they needed an adventure. Never having spent time here, they bought a campground at the beginning of the last season, and haven’t looked back. They love Montana life, and have enjoyed the campground business. Better than the B and B business, these folks aren’t actually in your home and your space, but they get to spend time with interesting people from all over.
Lisa helped me find a garage in Miles City, no small feat. The auto dealership had sent all their guys to a clinic. Three garages couldn’t see me til Friday. At last Bill Kelly agreed to take a look, checked my cooling system, and said he saw absolutely nothing wrong. Time to continue the trek west.

Bubba and I were a little cowed by the signs in all the rest stops cautioning travelers to stay on the path and watch out for rattlesnakes. Another place where myopia and colorblindness will not serve me well. We trod cautiously, but I think it’s too damn cold for any self-respecting rattlesnake to be out there anyway.

We stopped at Pompey’s Pillar, almost on the 200th anniversary, Lewis and Clark were here in July, 1806. Apparently the site is a favored location for school field trips from Billings at this time of year, so they were busy. There is a ranger on-site, but the Lewis and Clark commemorative group in the area provides volunteer docents to guide the kids around. There is a wooden staircase leading to the top of the rock. Awww, I shouldn’t have written that, better to have you think I scaled it. They have barriers to prevent people carving more graffiti on the soft sandstone; there are signatures dating forward from Wm. Clark’s, as well as petroglyphs predating his.

The Yellowstone River flows by about 100 yards from the rock. It was a cold and windy morning, but the sky was beginning to clear, and there’s a taste, just a taste of spring here.

There were cliff swallows darting in and out of the holes in the rock, as well as in the bluff across the river, and meadowlarks were singing on the edge of the adjacent meadow.

After stretching our legs and enjoying our respective lunches, Bubba and I piled back in for the trip to Bozeman. Lest you be concerned about whether my air conditioning is working, we’re still in winter here. There were snow piles on the side of the road east of Miles City and sporadically since. Here’s the view of the Crazy Mountains as we drove west of Billings.

I’m settled into a few days at Andra and Dan Spurr’s little cabin behind their house. An actual bathroom, no frozen midnight run out of the van! Bubba is playing with their border collies, Boulder and Tibo. We went out to dinner last night with Dan’s daughter and son-in-law and their little ones, Oliver and Isabelle. Everyone on the streets and in the restaurant looks young, healthy. Perhaps I will too!

I left Bismarck after a quiet and pleasant sleep with the rain falling on the roof of the van, and a bunch of weird dreams about my future life. The landscape began to change again about 40 miles west of Bismarck. There were still a lot of large soybean and corn farms, but there was also a lot of range land, with some Holsteins, but a lot of Angus. We’re in piece o’meat country now! As we continued, the rain dried up, but the sky was low and grey almost all day. The contours of the land began to shift, from flat flat farms to rolling hills and interesting shapes, cones jutting out of a valley, hills that looked like drip castles. About 45 miles from the Montana border, we moved into the real badlands. The Theodore Roosevelt National Park is not as well known as the South Dakota badlands, but since I declined to travel through South Dakota in my own little private boycott against abortion legislation recently signed into law by the Governor, I thought I’d enjoy this little brother badland. It’s quite incredible. The park is two distinct parcels of land, the southern one, which includes the headwaters of the Little Missouri River, and the northern one, which is bisected by the Little Missouri, but about 50 miles to the north. I spent some time exploring the southern portion.

The landscapes remind me of the Grand Canyon in miniature, but no less dramatic, perhaps just in a scale that I could comprehend. A unique feature of the landscape is provided by the coal seams running through the land. Fires have ignited the coal seams and baked the surrounding clay and sand. As erosion has removed the softer material, the hills have remained capped with this hard-baked material, with colorful striations through its mass.

In what looks like a barren landscape, there’s plenty of life. Way too cold for the snakes, but mountain bluebirds crossed my path, as did wild turkeys, I saw some wild horses from a distance, and we saw quite a number of bison. They calved about two weeks ago. The little ones watched us curiously, the adults were way too jaded to pay attention. As we drove past some bison, Bubba’s behavior was interesting. He looked out the window, and you could almost see the thought in a balloon over his head,”I am NOT making eye contact with this dude, he’s MUCH too big!” He turned his back on the open window and lay down out of the line of sight of the bison. His behavior was quite different as we passed a prairie dog town. “Mom, for me? PLEASE can I have one? or a bunch?” The only acceptable answer was no. I’m betting I could find a bunch of local ranchers who would hire him though.

I had a chance to talk with one of the rangers who’s been working on wildlife management issues. They worked with Montana State University to define a carrying capacity of the land for the herds of bison, horses and elk. There are not enough predators to keep the herds a manageable size for the land, although wildcats do take some down, and coyotes are believed to take some of the sick animals. They work with some of the local Indian tribes, and have transferred some of the bison to them for their own herds, for ceremonial purposes and for meat. They cannot allow any hunting without a change of their authorizing legislation, although some type of hunting will probably be necessary, in combination with other management techniques, to control the size of the population. The consequence of not controlling the population is habitat damage and a weaker sicker population. But they must be concerned about the public image of the Park Service allowing hunting in the parks, and the politics probably will make it impossible. I was reminded of our discussions at an Association of Nature Center Administrators Conference some years ago, when a number of us were talking about white tailed deer management issues in the northeast. We were all experiencing habitat damage from deer browsing at our centers. We recognized that several years of education of the public would be necessary before any action would be taken, or we would be pilloried for allowing Bambi to be killed. The climate is more hunter-oriented in the west, but the legislative changes would have to take place in Washington, and, regardless of the science, there would be loud opposition. There would be equally loud opposition from ranchers to the reintroduction of predators (wolves) who could play an active role in controlling the population.

I went from the park to the National Cowboy Hall of Fame in Medora, ND. I wasn’t there but a few minutes when a local cowboy stopped in to tell me it looked like there was a problem with my brakes, based on the powdery black buildup on my wheels, and that I seemed to have a radiator leak. The van is a great place to sleep, but doesn’t seem to be such a great place to drive lately. I decided to get myself to a community where I could find a service station before dark, so drove on with only a short view of the famous cowboys.

As I crossed the border into Montana, the sun came out for the first time since Iowa. I’d been feeling apprehensive as I drove across North Dakota: “What have I done? Is this a crazy trip?” I figure that the sun shining through those big Montana skies is prophetic. I’ll check in with a garage in Miles City in the morning and see if I can get Maybelline squared away for the last leg of the trip.

I arrived in Winona, Minnesota, in time for a pre-lunch bike ride with Taff Roberts, our old friend from Newport. Taff and Anne were married in 1989, and some of you were involved in the great potluck we threw at Eisenhower House for that wonderful autumn wedding. I remember some great dances with Benj, he was two at the time. They moved to Winona about a year later, and few of us have been able to wrest ourselves away from our East Coast umbilical cord to see them. Anne teaches art at Winona State University, and they have a lovely Victorian house about two blocks from the University. It’s a wonderful and welcoming house. Winona has lovel wide streets, lined with trees, and spacious sidewalks. Behind their house is an alley, and Bubba and I parked Maybelline II in the alley behind their garage and camped there. Bubba was warmly received by Wrigley, their Welsh Corgi (Of course Taff would have a Welsh dog!) and the two of them played for three days, with occasional skirmishes on food issues.

Taff and I took off on bikes and he took me for a short tour of Winona. There are two universities, Winona State and St. Mary’s; both are very integrated into the life of the community, and there are wonderful lectures, concerts, etc. that are well attended by community residents. There is a lake in town, only a five minute walk from their house, and a bike/walking/skate path that goes around the lake, as well as a building available for functions.Spring was busting out in Winona, and lilacs were just opening. I’ve been meandering through the seasons, and, in Winona, am back to where I was in Gettysburg Easter weekend, with early spring upon us. But it was warm and lovely. We rode over to the Food Coop that Taff has been involved with since he came here. It’s a wonderful coop with great produce, organic and health food stuff, and a little gathering place for lunch.

Anne had an Art Club cookout for her students and colleagues in their garden, followed by our attendance at Gareth’s 8th grade band concert. The middle school is a beautiful new facility a few miles from their house, and band is a huge deal there. In a school with classes of about 300, there are probably 150 students in the 8th grade band, with great depth of numbers in each section. They even had a bassoon player. And the quality of their work was, I thought, exceptional, more like what you’d expect to see from college level students. The band teacher was about to retire, and obviously had a great deal of affection for and skill with the students. It was a pleasure to be there.

On Friday, Taff took me out for a couple of real treats. First, he drove me out into the country, to Wiscoy, where there are two intentional communities: folks dedicated to a less consumerist and healthier lifestyle, many living off the grid, and quite a few involved in farm politics. One of the interesting issues was the development of a major confined production hog farm in the vicinity. We met Taff’s friend, Jim, who has been involved nationally and internationally in organic standards development; he was a chief vocal opponent of the project. He believes that the sinkholes and karst soils in the area will cause the hog waste to infiltrate into the ground water. His vocal opposition has led to threats to his position at the University.

In the afternoon, Taff rented kayaks and we went paddling on the Mississippi. Not out there in the current (runs about 8 kt, Taff said), but in this interesting backwater that’s part of a National Wildlife Refuge. I was there at the perfect time while the river is high in the spring, so we paddled through areas accessible only at this high water stage, through what looked like the forest primeval, into a heron and egret rookery. We sat in our kayaks and watched them building their nests. We also saw one of the largest turtles sunning itself on a log that I’d ever seen. Only yards from the railroad tracks, major commercial shipping on the river, and a highway, we were witness to a remarkable sight.

Anne was gone for the day to Milwaukee. She has an extraordinary opportunity to study and travel in China for the month of June and went to attend an orientation for the trip. So we went out to dinner with four friends of Gareth’s, along with the parents of two of the kids. He teaches biology at Winona State, and had gotten the position after being turned down for a job he’d applied for at Warren Wilson College. Sarah’s loss is the Roberts/Plummer family’s gain. She is from Louisiana, he, from Italy. They and their kids were great to spend an evening with. We went to a little hotel across the river in Wisconsin, and I had my first wall-eye. It’s time to learn that not all fish comes from the ocean. We came back to Taff and Anne’s house and saw a computer slide show of the Winona Earth day parade, featuring a flock of giraffes made in Taff’s back yard. They were wonderful! The heads and necks were of papier-mache, and the bodies were giraffe’patterned sheets covering two kids each, who had on white suits painted in giraffe pattern as well. The kids, were, of course, thrilled to see themselves, or at least their legs. I guess they were quite a hit in the parade. These construction projects have been an annual event. Last year was Peace doves. Now they’re discussing a wooly mammoth for next year!

Saturday was wet and raw. Anne took me to the studio and galleries at the University. They lit the wonderful little fire in their kitchen, and we spent the afternoon and early evening playing Boggle and eating pizza, my contribution to the day. Sunday, as they headed off to Quaker meeting, Bubba and I loaded up and hit the road again.

I drove up a road that parallels the river. For the first 30 miles, there were lots of these little back eddies off the river that were full of bird life. Apparently there’s a flourishing eagle community along the river, I spotted one as I drove along. On both sides of the river, limestone bluffs rise up, pockmarked with holes occupied by cliff swallows swooping out for an insect snack. Closer to Minneapolis-St.Paul, the land becomes more rolling and rises up from the river.

In Minneapolis, I turned away from the river, and passed by the Mall of America without even a moment’s temptation. The land continued to change throughout the day. West of Minneapolis, we moved into open farmland. As we approached Fargo, the land was perfectly flat. Clumps of trees looked like islands rising out of a sea of farmland.
West of Fargo, the highway stretched out for miles through farms of corn and soy, now on a very large scale. Highway exits are miles and miles apart, gas and bathroom stops require planning and timing. We drove on for hours, wanting to make some distance, and stopped for the evening at Bismarck, North Dakota. Sprng has barely reached us here, folks. It’s a cold and wet rain, not 50 degrees, and I’m glad to have that down comforter and warm dog. Most of the campgrounds hereabouts aren’t open yet, and the one I’m in has few visitors in this bleak weather. The host/owner is from Montana, settled here, and is waiting for his wife to fly back from Miles City, but the weather is, as he said, “too soupy”. A good description. Some snow is forecast for Monday night!

We spent a quiet night outside of Kansas City and drove north and east. Iowa was quite a surprise.Much of the middle of the state was what I expected, with my provincial prejudices: flat, mega-farming, blah. But the southwest and northeast corners are absolutely lovely: rolling hills, farms on a smaller scale, immaculately clean towns and apparently flourishing businesses in those little towns. I spent the afternoon driving around the area where Ellen Walsh and Emma Deutsch, two of the farm volunteers, are from, in the northeast corner of the state. Bubba and I went to dinner at Ellen’s folks’ restaurant, the Irish Shanti, in Gunder, Iowa (try to find that on the map, you Rhode Islandahs). Ellen’s folks were most hospitable, although on their way out for the evening. They met in Alaska, he’s from Massachusetts, and they came back to the area 30 years ago and settled, since that’s where her mom’s from. Her dad still sounds like he’s from Massachusetts! A friendly and pleasant evening out,, check out their website, www.thegunderburger.com. You can’t take the Irish out of a Boston Irishman!

Although Bubba had to wait in the van while I dined, I couldn’t resist ordering a ribeye steak that I split with him. He was thrilled with the bounty, if not so much with waiting outside.

We spent the night at a county campground in Elgin, Iowa, Ellen has since e-mailed me that it was family land, given for conservation. It’s a gorgeous spot, on the banks of the river and used as a canoe launch, next to a farm field, and full of bird life. Coyote life as well, I suspect, Bubba and I thought we heard one at night. We had a lovely stroll by the river at night and through the cornfield in the morning. I stopped for breakfast in Decorah, an unusual outing, and further indulged Bubba with a strip of bacon, before we drove on into Minnesota.